Containers, for example, beverage cans made of a light metal material, are generally known. These containers hold a beverage, for example, and are at first completely hermetically sealed towards the outside. In a lid of such a container, a closure is arranged, which is moved from a first to a further position in order to form an opening in the lid, thus providing access to the beverage held within the container. There are uses where the closure is secured to the lid of the container in such a manner to ensure that it will not be lost. However, this configuration has the drawback that the opening cannot be closed again once it has been formed in the lid and is no longer covered by the closure.
This means there is a general need to provide a container designed to be filled with a medium, in particular a liquid such as a beverage, which is introduced into the container and is at first tightly sealed therein relative to the outside of the container. Actuation of the closure serves to provide access to the medium while ensuring that the opening formed in the container can be closed again if not all of the medium has been removed from the container. A typical example is a carbonated beverage in a beverage can, where the beverage can must be re-closed if not all of the carbonated beverage has been drunk from the beverage can. The same is of course true of other types of beverages, such as hot beverages. Here, the opening formed to remove the beverage should also be reclosable to ensure that the temperature of the hot beverage remains almost constant on the one hand and to prevent the hot beverage from spilling out of the container through the opening due to movement of the beverage can on the other.
To meet the aforesaid needs, a closing and opening device for a container designed to hold a liquid is known from German patent application DE 20 2010 002 240 U1, for example, comprising a lid base that can be secured to the open end of the container and has an axial opening, comprising a bistable lid having a concave geometry in a first stable state following exertion of a first axial force and a convex geometry in its second stable state following exertion of a second axial force. The lid covers the axial opening of the lid base from above. A valve slide, the upper side of which is connected to the lower side of the lid, extends through the axial opening in the lid base and a radially outer portion of which can be arranged in sealing contact with an axially lower sealing surface of the lid base. A pressure relief valve is formed on the valve slide of this liquid removal valve, which pressure relief valve is actuated by exerting an axial force on the lid in the opening direction, in the same way as the valve slide of the liquid removal valve, but wherein the pressure relief valve is actuated in the opening direction before actuating the valve slide. This configuration is suitable for opening the container for first use while relatively small forces are required for actuation. However, the entire structure of the closure device of this known container is extremely difficult and complex, resulting in disadvantages during manufacture, in particular in the case of automated manufacture, and in terms of costs.